E-lessons Archive

Solid dictionary skills are a crucial element of successful English-language learning, and these dictionary e-lessons are designed to help you pass on these skills to your students. In each e-lesson we offer full teaching notes and photocopiable worksheets on key elements of dictionaries, ranging from simple tasks like using guide words, to more detailed discussion about metaphor, idioms and phrases.

You can search the e-lessons archive by dictionary. Select the dictionary in the top right corner, then click on the ‘Search the Archive’ button.


 

  • Media

    • Macmillan Essential Dictionary
    • Intermediate
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    Television and newspapers are key elements of the culture of any country, providing news and information, as well as entertainment and education. Being able to speak fluently about these topics opens an important door of social interaction for learners of English, and this e-lesson is designed to help them do exactly that. A series of exercises tests their knowledge of vocabulary specific to television and that of newspapers, then asks them to put that vocabulary to use in practice conversations.

    Student's Worksheet 0.11mb Download
    Teacher's Notes 0.04mb Download


  • Words that go together – part 1

    • Macmillan Essential Dictionary
    • Intermediate
    • author: Adrian Underhill
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    When learning new words in English, it can help a great deal to know what words are regularly used with them (collocates). This e-lesson is designed to address this, being the first in a two-part lesson on collocation and using the dictionary to find ‘Words often used with …’ . Part 1 takes three commonly used words, and asks students to use the ‘Words often used with …’ boxes in their dictionaries to find the right collocates.

    Student's Worksheet 0.05mb Download
    Teacher's Notes 0.04mb Download


  • Words that go together – part 2

    • Macmillan Essential Dictionary
    • Intermediate
    • author: Adrian Underhill
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    When learning new words in English, it can help a great deal to know what words are regularly used with them (collocates). This e-lesson is the second in a two-part look at collocation and using the dictionary to find words that go together. It asks students to begin using the more detailed information in the ‘Words often used with …’ boxes, to find different parts of speech and complete common phrases.

    Student's Worksheet 0.14mb Download
    Teacher's Notes 0.04mb Download


  • Exploring a dictionary page

    • Macmillan Essential Dictionary
    • Intermediate
    • author: Adrian Underhill
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    Solid dictionary skills are vital to successful language learning, but there is much more to using a learner’s dictionary than simply being able to find a word and understand its meaning. Knowing the function the word serves in everyday language, being aware of variations in meaning and spelling and being familiar with possible alternatives are also crucial. In this e-lesson, students look in detail at how this information is presented in the dictionary and practise using it.

    Student's Worksheet 0.27mb Download
    Teacher's Notes 0.04mb Download


  • Word formation

    • Macmillan Essential Dictionary
    • Intermediate
    • author: Adrian Underhill
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    When learning a new language it’s often not enough just to know what a word means – real fluency lies in also understanding how that word came into being, and once the basic rules are understood, they can be applied time and time again. This e-lesson is designed to help students develop this skill, through activities exploring the use of prefixes, suffixes and the creation of compounds.

    Student's Worksheet 0.05mb Download
    Teacher's Notes 0.04mb Download


  • Words with many meanings

    • Macmillan Essential Dictionary
    • Intermediate
    • author: Adrian Underhill
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    English has many words which carry multiple meanings, and it can be difficult for learners to choose the right one. To help them deal with this problem, the Macmillan Essential Dictionary features special ‘menu’ boxes for words with more than five meanings, and this e-lesson offers students valuable practice in using these menu boxes and navigating longer dictionary entries.

    Student's Worksheet 0.06mb Download
    Teacher's Notes 0.04mb Download


  • Text types – description

    • Macmillan Essential Dictionary
    • Intermediate
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    As learners begin to use more complicated descriptive vocabulary, their language starts to sound more fluent and natural. This e-lesson is designed to help them in this process, offering them a chance to investigate and familiarize themselves with descriptive terms, and start putting them into practice.

    Student's Worksheet 0.09mb Download
    Teacher's Notes 0.04mb Download


  • Expand your vocabulary

    • Macmillan Essential Dictionary
    • Intermediate
    • author: Adrian Underhill
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    As learners of English progress in their language skills, they leave behind generalized words and phrases, and move on to move interesting and exact ways of speaking. This e-lesson is designed to help them in this process, through use of the ‘Other ways of saying …’ and ‘Types of …’ boxes in the dictionary, at entries like cook, walk and television.

    Student's Worksheet 0.07mb Download
    Teacher's Notes 0.04mb Download


  • Find the right word

    • Macmillan Essential Dictionary
    • Intermediate
    • author: Adrian Underhill
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    As learners of English progress in their language skills, they find themselves in need of a more nuanced and precise vocabulary. This e-lesson is designed to help them develop this, utilizing the dictionary’s ‘Words that you can use instead of …’ boxes appearing at common terms like bad and nice.

    Student's Worksheet 0.07mb Download
    Teacher's Notes 0.04mb Download


  • Work

    • Macmillan Essential Dictionary
    • Intermediate
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    This e-lesson is designed to help students develop a more in-depth knowledge of the vocabulary relating to jobs and work. Drawing on students’ own experience of the workplace, the exercises centre around a series of job ads, each in a different style and using key work-related words and phrases.

    Student's Worksheet 0.07mb Download
    Teacher's Notes 0.04mb Download


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